Victoria Tower (Canada) - Victoria Tower Bell

Victoria Tower Bell

The Victoria Tower Bell is the only relic remaining from the Victoria Tower. It was cast in 1875 and installed in the tower in 1877. The bell fell from the tower during the Centre Block fire of 1916. The actual tower structure (outer walls) survived the fire, but the upper bell tower had collapsed on February 3 and torn down during the reconstruction of the Centre Block.

The bell was restored in the year 2000, and placed on the grounds of Parliament Hill as a monument to the 1916 fire and to Canada's first Centre Block parliamentary building. It is showcased on a circular granite base, etched as the face of a clock, that represents its role in the keeping of time. The bell's inclined position recalls the angle at which it came to rest after falling during the fire of 1916.

Read more about this topic:  Victoria Tower (Canada)

Famous quotes containing the words victoria, tower and/or bell:

    Sometimes my wife complains that she’s overwhelmed with work and just can’t take one of the kids, for example, to a piano lesson. I’ll offer to do it for her, and then she’ll say, “No, I’ll do it.” We have to negotiate how much I trespass into that mother role—it’s not given up easily.
    —Anonymous Father. As quoted in Women and Their Fathers, by Victoria Secunda, ch. 3 (1992)

    What did it matter where you lay once you were dead? In a dirty sump or in a marble tower on top of a high hill? You were dead, you were sleeping the big sleep, you were not bothered by things like that. Oil and water were the same as wind and air to you.
    Raymond Chandler (1888–1959)

    Where the bee sucks, there suck I,
    In a cowslip’s bell I lie;
    There I couch when owls do cry.
    On the bat’s back I do fly
    After summer merrily.
    Merrily, merrily shall I live now,
    Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)